Andersen Service Corporation v. Old Republic Surety Company (Fla. 4th DCA Jan. 7, 2026) is a clean, important reminder that arbitration is a matter of contract—and that sureties cannot manufacture arbitration rights where none exist.

In this case, a subcontractor recorded a construction lien for unpaid work and the lien was transferred to a lien transfer bond under section 713.24, Florida Statutes. The bond was issued by the surety, Old Republic, but the surety was not a party to the underlying subcontract. The subcontract contained an arbitration provision, but it gave only the general contractor—not the subcontractor and not the surety—the unilateral right to elect arbitration. Critically, the lien transfer bond itself contained no arbitration language and did not incorporate the subcontract.

When the subcontractor sued the surety directly on the lien transfer bond in Broward County, the surety moved to compel arbitration in Pennsylvania based on the subcontract’s dispute-resolution clause. The trial court granted the motion. The Fourth District reversed.

Applying well-settled Florida arbitration law, the court focused first on the threshold question: whether a valid written agreement to arbitrate existed between the parties actually before the court. It did not. The surety was a nonsignatory to the subcontract, the bond did not reference or incorporate the subcontract, and the bond was the sole subject of the lawsuit. Without an arbitration agreement binding the subcontractor and the surety, the first—and most basic—element required to compel arbitration was missing.

The court also rejected the surety’s attempt to rely on equitable estoppel and “coextensive obligations” cases. Those doctrines apply only where the bond expressly incorporates the underlying contract containing the arbitration provision. Here, unlike performance bond cases where incorporation language is present, the lien transfer bond stood on its own and was issued strictly pursuant to statute. A surety cannot invoke arbitration provisions reserved to its principal, particularly where the principal never elected arbitration in the first place.

The takeaway is straightforward but significant for construction litigators: a lien transfer bond claim is a statutory cause of action governed by the bond and Chapter 713—not by arbitration clauses in contracts the surety never signed and never incorporated. If the bond does not contain an arbitration agreement, the surety cannot force the claimant out of court and into arbitration, much less in another state.

For practitioners, Andersen Service Corporation is a useful citation when a surety overreaches by trying to piggyback on a contractor’s arbitration clause. Florida courts will enforce arbitration agreements—but only when an actual agreement to arbitrate exists between the parties.